Chest Exercise: Incline Dumbbell Fly

Introduction

There’s absolutely no doubt about it, when it comes to the single most important exercise to push your chest to the limit and achieve maximal results, there’s simply no better exercise than the bench press. Having said that, variety is the spice of life and your chest requires more stimulation than performing the same exercise day in day out.

With all of this in mind, the dumbbell fly and more importantly the incline dumbbell fly is more than capable of making up the numbers in your chest workout and further developing your pectoral muscles. Make no doubt about it, although considered a supporting exercise in the grand scale of a chest session, the incline dumbbell fly really can work your target muscle in its outer, weaker range and further develop strength and size.

The main problem with this exercise is that individuals really do seem to perform it badly. Whether this is because they’ve loaded the resistance too heavy and substituted form or because they’ve left it until the end of the workout and really have nothing else to give I’ll never know. Whatever the reason, there’s really no place in your chest session for poor form and bad technique. Not only does this make this exercise ineffective and inefficient, the greater problem of muscle imbalance and injury potential could also start to rear its ugly head.

With this in mind, here at FitnessBeans we’ve decided to eliminate this problem by breaking down the incline dumbbell fly into an easily digestible exercise prescription so that whilst others around you in the gym continue to get it wrong, you can be sure that your form is point perfect. So what do we expect from you during this exercise?

How To Perform The Incline Dumbbell Fly Exercise

Select dumbbells offering the appropriate resistance for this exercise.

Angle the bench on an incline at approximately 45 degree and lie on it supine.

Grasp both dumbbells and raise them above your chest.

Fix both arms in a slightly bent position and maintain throughout.

This is your starting position.

Lower the dumbbells out towards the sides of your shoulder region.

Continue to lower until a stretch is felt in your chest or shoulder region.

At this point start to bring the dumbbells back together until you reach the start position.

This is one repetition. Repeat until the required repetitions are achieved.

Incline Dumbbell Fly Exercise Video

When performed correctly, the incline dumbbell fly can target not only your major pectoral muscles, but your anterior deltoids and short head of the biceps muscles also. What’s more, if you utilise this exercise in the early stages of your chest workout then you might notice that you can achieve a greater range of motion during the subsequent bench press exercises. This exercise really does place a stretch through your chest like none other.

Final Word

Regardless of how superior the bench press is to your chest workout, the incline dumbbell fly really does deserve to be included on its own merits and definitely should feature in your training.